I’d love to write a bit about why each of these women rock in her own special way, but you’ll just have to take my word for it. I have a preschooler trying to carry her little brother (who’s more than half her weight) around the living room, and, mama duty calls.

Please accept the award, pass it along to five others and rock on, girls. Rock on. 😉

I’m working on behalf of our local CO API chapter to help find donations (which is part of the reason I haven’t been blogging much the past few days). If you make or sell something or just have something you’d like to donate (this can be just about anything and does NOT have to be AP-specific – clothing, books, jewelry, gift certificates, outdoor equipment, timeshare weeks, candles, collectibles, art, etc.) or know someone who does and would like to donate to API’s fundraiser, please email me for more info – amygeekgrl@gmail.com – or just go directly to the auction link above and add your item(s).

When you donate an item to API’s auction, you are encouraged to include a link to your business website, thereby promoting your brand and product to a target audience of nearly 4,500 API supporters! And that number will grow exponentially, since participants will be encouraged to forward e-mails and invite friends and families to participate in the auction.

We can accept donations throughout the course of the auction, however, the sooner you sign on, the more promotion you’ll enjoy as a generous item donor.

I’m very excited about the amount of different items available on the auction so far and hope to find even more great products to offer in the next week or so.

Oh, and don’t forget to bid on items yourself – API’s online auction! The proceeds go to a great cause. 🙂

“Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could reach every parent who wants to learn more, touch every child’s life, and educate a variety of care providers about the sound research on Attachment Parenting? We can make even greater strides in creating a Peaceful World for all of our children if we work on this campaign together. Please be a part of our vision; API can’t accomplish its goals without your help and support.”

National World Breastfeeding Week is Aug. 1 – 8, 2007. This year’s theme is: “Breastfeeding: The 1st Hour – Save ONE million babies!”

Here at the Crunchy Domestic Goddess, I am holding a photo contest and giving away a pro-breastfeeding t-shirt to help celebrate and promote the event.

Please submit your favorite breastfeeding picture of yourself and your baby/babies via email (click my email link: amygeekgrl@gmail.com and it will automatically put WBWContest in the subject line. If you type the address out yourself, please note there is NO “i” in “amygeekgrl”) by Sunday, July 15. One entry (one picture) per person, please. Please note that by submitting your photo, you are giving me permission to post it on my blog at a later date.

On Sunday morning, Jody, Ava, Julian and I braved the record-breaking 100 degree heat to attend the National Mile High Breastfeeding Celebration in Denver hoping to help break a record of a different kind.

Lactating mamas with babes, kids, hubbies and others in tow gathered together with the goal of breaking the national record for most women breastfeeding in public, as well as celebrating and promoting breastfeeding. The heat seemed to put a bit of a damper on the attendance, and we fell very short of breaking the national record, but a new record was set for the state of Colorado with around 200 women participating!

News cameras were poised at the ready, but the only station that appeared to run anything (and it was a very short clip at that) about the event on the evening news was Denver’s CBS station Channel 4. Channel 4 also ran a longer segment about it on the morning of the event (view the video) and interviewed Jennifer Weddig* of the Colorado Breastfeeding Task Force. And NBC’s Channel 9 published a story about it – Local moms try to beat national breastfeeding record – on their website. It’s a shame it didn’t get more coverage, but there was a lot of negative stuff in the news that day, and, as the oh so morbid saying in the business goes, “if it bleeds, it leads.”

Despite the heat, everyone seemed to enjoy themselves, especially all of the kiddos feasting on delicious mama milk. 🙂

Here are a few pics from the day…

*An aside, I believe I ran into Jennifer Weddig at the event. She commented on how she and some others really liked Ava’s “Li’l Lactivist” shirt and asked me where I got it, so I got to plug my store. 🙂 Too bad I didn’t have any business cards with me. Jody’s “My kid’s no weaner” shirt from The Lactivist store also got some compliments.

My posts have been few and far between this last week, but things are starting to slow down around here once again. I hope to post a recap of our very busy, but good week and get back to semi-regular blogging again soon.

I took a ton of pictures this week, but haven’t had time to edit more than a handful yet.

First is my choice for Best Shot Monday, and then a few more pics from this weekend’s birthday festivities (Ava turned 3) follow. I love this first one because it is Ava just being Ava – playing in the backyard with her stick “family” and just being a kid.

Be sure to click over to Picture This to see everyone else’s choices for Best Shot Monday.

Happy 3rd birthday to you, my dear daughter Ava today. I love you and am so proud to be your mama. 🙂

I hope you never lose your sense of wonder
You get your fill to eat
But always keep that hunger
May you never take one single breath for granted
God forbid love ever leave you empty handed
I hope you still feel small
When you stand by the ocean
Whenever one door closes, I hope one more opens
Promise me you’ll give faith a fighting chance

And when you get the choice to sit it out or dance
I hope you dance
I hope you dance

I hope you never fear those mountains in the distance
Never settle for the path of least resistance
Living might mean taking chances
But they’re worth taking
Lovin’ might be a mistake
But it’s worth making
Don’t let some hell bent heart
Leave you bitter
When you come close to selling out
Reconsider
Give the heavens above
More than just a passing glance

First, on Wednesday, get filling in tooth. Translation: spend most of the morning psyching myself up to go through with the filling, only to have my heart start racing like mad anyway when I was finally sitting in the chair and he was about to drill. Despite that the dentist was, in fact, a hottie, having my tooth drilled still hurt. I was so busy trying to find my happy place while staring intently at one spot on the ceiling that he could’ve looked like Frankenstein’s monster for all I cared. It was not my idea of a good time. In fact, I’d happily take natural pain med-free childbirth over a filling any day. Seriously. Apparently I’m a big wimp when it comes to dental work.

Secondly, on Thursday, have parents fly in from MI to stay with us (in mid- to upper-90 degree heat* with no A/C) for 6 days. Translation: clean the house the night before and then plan to sweat our selves silly.

Thirdly, on Friday, celebrate Ava’s 3rd birthday! Woot! 🙂 Translation: plan a fun-filled day for Ava, complete with favorite foods and a birthday cake. And write a letter to Ava to sum up the past year (something I do for her on every birthday). (Still working on all of that.)

Fourthly, on Saturday, throw a birthday party (in 94 degree heat) for Ava and friends at a local park. Translation: drive self crazy trying to get everything ready for the party. (I still have a bunch of things I need to buy.) Oh, and more sweating.

Fifthly, on Sunday, plan to attend the National Mile High Breastfeeding Celebration to participate in breaking the national record for the most women breastfeeding in one place. Also, plan to blog about it at a later date and take pictures to share on my blog and possibly with other bloggers. Did I mention it’s supposed to be 98 degrees that day?! Translation: pack family in the car to drive an hour to Denver, nurse Julian at the appointed time while sweating my butt off, pack family back into car for an hour drive back home. Nah, I’m sure we will hang out and have a good time. I just wish it wasn’t going to be 98 degrees.

Sixthly, also on Sunday, plan to attend sister’s “I graduated from law school” party. Translation: even more sweating to ensue, but this time with free food. 🙂

Whew! Is that all? Yes, that’s all. Are you sensing a theme?

Any one of those things by itself in a week would be all fine and good (preferably with cooler temps), but to try to do all of them in the span of five days qualifies me for the crazy award. If I’m not blogging the next few days, you’ll know why. I’ll be on the crazy train. Sweating. 😉

*Jody and I finally got around to watching Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth” the other night. It’s only been sitting on our entertainment center for a month now. I plan to blog about it another time, but can you say “global warming?”

On Wednesday afternoon I’m heading in to see a new (to me) dentist to have a cavity filled. At least, I hope that’s all that has to be done.

I’ve had this decay in my back bottom tooth (molar) since I was pregnant with Julian. My dentist at the time said he’d fix it when I was no longer pregnant. Well, that darn tooth started hurting a lot one day so I made another appointment. By the time I was seen again (a few days after it started acting up), it was no longer hurting, and, because I was still pregnant, he said we should wait to do anything about it until I had the baby.

The baby is now nearly 7 months old and I’ve yet to go in and get that tooth filled. I’ve had a cleaning since Julian was born though, and talked to the dentist then about filling it. But I discovered at that time that he uses amalgam (i.e. mercury) fillings and something about that didn’t sit right with me.

I started doing some research about mercury fillings and found a bunch of information about why it’s not necessarily safe to have them. So why get them at all when alternatives (composite, gold, porcelain) are available?

One of the big concerns if you are a woman who has amalgam fillings and has had children is that you’ve likely passed mercury to your child in utero and then also exposed them to mercury while breastfeeding. (Of course, amalgam fillings or not, breast milk is still the best possible nutrition for your babies.) It is for those reasons that many women are having their amalgam fillings removed and replaced.

From HeartSpring.net: Elemental (metallic) mercury and its compounds are toxic and exposure to excessive levels can permanently damage or fatally injure the brain and kidneys. Elemental mercury can also be absorbed through the skin and cause allergic reactions. Ingestion of inorganic mercury compounds can cause severe renal and gastrointestinal toxicity. Organic compounds of mercury such as methylmercury are considered the most toxic forms of the element. Exposures to very small amounts of these compounds can result in devastating neurological damage and death.

For fetuses, infants and children, the primary health effects of mercury are on neurological development. Even low levels of mercury exposure such as result from mother’s consumption methylmercury in dietary sources can adversely affect the brain and nervous system. Impacts on memory, attention, language and other skills have been found in children exposed to moderate levels in the womb.

I feel fortunate that I’ve only had a couple very small cavities in the past and they were filled with composite fillings.

Anyway, I decided to find a dentist who didn’t use amalgam. I asked some friends and found one who accepts our insurance. So that’s where I’m headed tomorrow. *Gulp*

From what I hear, this dentist is pretty easy on the eyes. I guess if you have to have someone drilling in your mouth, they could at least be cute. 😉 Still, I’m not too excited about this. Wish me luck.

Breastfeeding has been in the news here locally quite a bit this past week. It all started when a nursing woman was asked to cover-up or move while feeding her 5-month-old son by the wave pool at Elitch Gardens in Denver. Apparently some people at the pool complained that she was exposing herself. (Note: Nearly naked women walking around in skimpy bikinis is not offensive, but using your breasts for the purpose which they were intended is.) The woman knew that CO law (CRS 25-6-301, 25-6-302 (2004) recognizes the benefits of breastfeeding and encourages mothers to breastfeed. The law also allows a mother to breastfeed in any place she has a right to be. [SB 88]) protected her right to breastfeed anywhere she has the right to be and stated that to the employees, who then proceeded to get their supervisor and eventually the Denver police involved. Ultimately, she was able to feed her son, but only while being harassed the whole time and told it was “common sense” that she should cover up or move. Common sense to put a blanket over the baby’s head in 90 degree heat? Huh?

I feel so bad for this mom for having to deal with that for simply trying to feed her son. I applaud her for knowing her rights and not backing down despite them berating her.

I don’t understand the people who find a baby eating to be so offensive. If it honestly bothers them that much, why do they insist upon looking? Why not turn your head and look elsewhere?

Some local moms held a nurse-in at Elitch’s a few days after the incident, which also made headlines.

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On a more positive note, the other local breastfeeding event is the upcoming National Mile High Breastfeeding Celebration to be held from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Sunday, June 24, at the Auraria Campus in Denver. The event features family-friendly vendors, food, and entertainment for the whole family, as well as an attempt to set a national record for the most number of women breastfeeding at one time. The goal to surpass is 1,130 moms. Registration is required for participation in the record-setting event.

It sounds like a fun way to spend the day and support the cause, so me and the fam are going to head down there and hopefully help break the record. 🙂 Anybody else local to Denver going to participate?